What is the job title of the scientist who invents new flavors of ice cream? Would that person be called a “Sub-Zero Fructose Particle Physicist” or an “Engineer of Glucose Oriented Solid H²O”? Even though most developers of new ice cream flavors have PhD’s in Inter-Quantitative Physical Bioengineering or something, they still can’t figure out how to make the most tried and true flavor of ice cream that is not yet in existence. Sugar Cereal Ice Cream!!!! Come on guys….. This one is a no-brainer. Since the dawn of the modern era, America’s fat little children have been addicted to consuming a thousand calories of sugar cereals every morning, so why not sell the product in the form of ice cream? For an explanation, or lack there of, we must start at the beginning.
When I was growing up in the late 1970’s, we only had a few flavors of ice cream to choose from. Soft serve came in essentially two flavors (Vanilla and Chocolate - sometimes Strawberry). Hard serve offered more options such as Peppermint Stick, Coffee, Mint Chocolate Chip and even Bubble Gum. Toppings were limited to colored/chocolate sprinkles (aka: jimmies), hot chocolate sauce, whipped cream, fruits (aka: cherries and bananas), and nuts. Fruit flavored Sherbet was also available at most ice cream stands and the ice cream truck had it’s own varieties of sugar/dairy mixtures, but nobody had anything as outstanding as the flavors that are available today.
One of the turning points for ice cream came with the invention of the Reese’s Pieces Sundae. This discovery of adding grotesque amounts of sugar and candy to dairy products opened the doors for a conglomerate of new flavors. Eventually, hard serve flavors options such as Cookie Dough and Cake Batter came to be. Flavor Bursts and Milky Way/Heath Bar Blizzards enhanced the soft serve experience. Cold Stone Creamery gave the consumer the option to customize their flavor by crushing the topping of their choice into “the cream”. In the early 1990’s, the overeducated developers of new ice cream flavors not only successfully invented a way to make ice cream taste like Cotton Candy, but they also managed to provide us with Dippin’ Dots. Who would have thought that you could mix sugar with liquid-nitrogen and create an edible product that doesn’t lead to an overabundance of personal injury lawsuits?
Nonetheless, these advances in ice cream technology have not satisfied my need for ice cream that has been infused with sugar cereal. A half-hearted attempt was made in the early 1980’s by some of the worlds most entrusted food scientists at Quaker Oats. They developed a version of Cap’N Crunch ice cream, but it was basically a vanilla and strawberry flavored Éclair with some Cap’N Crunch sprinkled on the outside of it.
The infused delicacy that I’m thinking of might need someone more plebian than a member of the scientific community for it’s development. That leads us to the next question…… where are Ben and Jerry? They are the ones who brought us a plethora of some of the most outstanding flavor combinations ever, such as:
Chunky Monkey
Cherry Garcia
Chocolate Fudge Brownie
Half-Baked
New York Super Fudge Chunk
Phish Food
Karamel Sutra
Everything But The…..
Chunky Monkey
Cherry Garcia
Chocolate Fudge Brownie
Half-Baked
New York Super Fudge Chunk
Phish Food
Karamel Sutra
Everything But The…..
Rumor has it they are lost in the Amazon Jungle licking the backs of psychoactive frogs or something. Maybe we can entice them back to the United States with the challenge of inventing Golden Grahams, Apple Jacks, Fruit Loops, or Captain Crunch flavored ice cream….. Or maybe I’ll have to invent this one myself.